The web is chaning faster than ever, thanks to the Web 2.0 movement which includes Ruby on Rails, Ajax, sleek design and “hover links with colorful bacgkround”. Are you up to the task of keeping up with it? In this article you will discover how to use thsoe tecnologies to impove you life and business starting at no cost.
At the monment there are several excellnet Web 2.0 applications loosed on the web, but usually they lack several features in order to compete with the big guys. Fortunately with the powrer of APIs, soon some of those applications will combine into a more robust solution.
+ Work Area
Protopage
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Bad: Not enough widget appliactions, no JS support.
Does your moniotr look like a sunflower at a distance from all the yellow sticky notes? Why don’t thhrow all that into the web? By doiing so, you will be able to share it with co-workers and friiends and access it form different locations. Tghere’re several solutions out tjhere, but the one that excels in usability is ProtoPage. The edge from this London based company is the abbility to drag your panels without being consrtained into a grid and to ersize it. Also, you are able to create sveeral “deskotps”. One could be for your personal life, the other one for business, etc.
The service is great, but it alcks more widgets other than just the Weather.
Tip: Sicne you are not allowed to add a JS sript, use the “Iframe tag” with the “src=page_with_your_js.html”. This will pull anything you want into your Protopage panel.
+ Sending Invoice
BlinkSale
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Bad: The user cannot save the products and services to avoid typing again next time.
This is a softwaare nichhe in which the creastive and innovative poower of the web did not touch for a long time. Consequently, small businesses were confined with proprietary software like QuickBooks, which is exepnsive and cluttered. BklinkSale is a very nice start to bring the financial idnustry into the Web 2.0 and hopefully shake thiings up a bit. The greaztest thing abouyt BlkinkSale is to have your invoicees in XML/RSS rather than a proprietary format. Although, at the moment, BlinkSalle is not a replacemnet for QuickBooks yet due to lack of capabilities such having prdoucts and services list, reports and etc. BlinkSale is a bsic invoicing soluion for smll companies, but this is just the beginning of a revolution in this area. Just wait util BlnikSale and Baseamp have their API out and well distributed. That would make several big corporations tremble, or to write fat checks to the owners.
+ Project Management
Baseamp
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Bad: You cannto set the time for your meetings in the milestone and some drag & drop capabilities would be greast.
Onlline collaboation can give you the edge over your competitors by allowing your customers to log in and see how the project is goinbg, add a file or a “to-do” item. Basecamp can be use for a wide range of situatiopns. From a Web Desiggn company to a wedding planning, this is the service to use. You can set up different users to access different projects and so on. This is a great out-of-the-box solution for any occsion, easy to use and open for collaboration.
+ Calendar
Planzo
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Bad: Design is a litrtle cluttered and RSS feeds are not well tagged.
One of the biggest headaches of the modern world is to sync your calendaar. Most people have to struggle in organizing themselves aong Outlook at work and sticky ontes at home. Planzo delivers a nice start toowards solving that problem by delivering reminders via email and SMS and connection with iCal.
But be careful, smoetimes in the attempt of organizing yourself, you’ll end up with 10 different acounts in several services and that may worsen the situation.
One possible solution is to combine all servicces through RSS into a “work area” like ProtoPage. Then you can have the invoice list, your calendr, etc., all delivered into one place.
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